Apple Finally Gives the MacBook Pro a Touchscreen
Apple Finally Gives the MacBook Pro a Touchscreen
Apple spent years treating touchscreens on laptops as the wrong answer to the wrong question. This week, it changed course.
Earlier in the week, the company’s Mac news had looked routine: an OLED iPad mini on Monday, then M6 refreshes for the MacBook Pro and iMac on Tuesday. Those Macs were described as quiet, familiar-looking upgrades. But Apple’s invitation-only Los Angeles gathering promised something more consequential: a rethink of the Mac for touch, held away from Apple Park and without a public livestream.
On Wednesday, the company made that shift official at its “Pro and tell” event, unveiling its first MacBook Pro with an OLED touchscreen. The machine starts at $2,899 for the 14-inch model and $3,399 for the 16-inch version; preorders opened immediately, with release set for November 6.
Apple calls the panel “PROLED XDR,” a tandem OLED display with up to 2,000 nits of peak SDR brightness, a 120Hz refresh rate and a claimed 10,000,000:1 contrast ratio. Buyers can choose M5 Pro or M5 Max chips—not the M6 used in the other MacBook Pro updates—and will find an iPhone-like Dynamic Island in the display, plus the return of the glowing Apple logo.
The reversal is not merely cosmetic. Apple says the touch sensor is built directly into the display rather than placed in a separate layer, a design it says cuts latency. Its argument for touch centers on scrolling and photo zooming, but also on testing iOS and iPadOS apps and playing software instruments. Apple says its own apps have been optimized and that a revised API will let developers add touch support.
For a company long associated with the split between keyboard-and-trackpad Macs and touch-first iPads, the new MacBook Pro is a concession to demand—and a bid to define touch on its own premium terms.
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